CARAVAGGIO

Italian painter, born at Caravaggio, near Bergamo, and apprenticed in 1584 in Milan to Simone Peterzano, who claimed to be a pupil of Titian . By 1592 , with both parents dead, he had run through his inheritance. Soon afterwards he left for Rome, where he lived in poverty, did various hack work, and then painted fruits and flowers in the studio of Cavaliere d'Arpino . Two highly finished early half-lengths of youths with prominent still lifes are the Sick Bacchus and the Boy with a Basket of Fruit (both Rome, Borghese Gal.). Later, he sold his work through a dealer and the Cardsharpers (Fort Worth, Kimbell Mus.) attracted the attention of Cardinal del Monte who took Caravaggio into his household, probably around 1595 – 6 . The Cardsharps and the contemporary Gypsy Fortune-Teller (Rome, Capitoline Mus.) were a new genre in which contemporary types, painted from life, enact anecdotal tableaux of deceit.

Del Monte was at the centre of the most cultured circles in Rome and Caravaggio made contact with advanced patrons such as Vincenzo Giustiniani and with leading poets such as Gaspare Murtola and Giambattista Marino who both celebrated his paintings. Music was especially important and it provided the theme for the Musicians (New York, Met. Mus.) and the Lute-Player (St Petersburg, Hermitage), in both of which lightly draped androgynous musicians embody an unattainable world of beauty and refinement.

Caravaggio's first major Roman religious commission was for the Contarelli chapel in S. Luigi dei Francesi where the two lateral paintings (both in situ) were unveiled in 1600 . In these works Caravaggio first made expressive use of extreme chiaroscuro and (especially in the Calling of S. Matthew) he depicted the story as a contemporary scene. Their realism and dramatic power created a sensation, making Caravaggio overnight the most celebrated painter in Rome. Nevertheless, the church authorities rejected his first version of the chapel's altarpiece depicting the Inspiration of S. Matthew (destr., formerly Berlin, Kaiser Friedrich Mus.). This was snapped up for his private collection by Giustiniani , who arranged for Caravaggio to make a more conventional replacement (in situ).

The Contarelli chapel paintings were the first of six major Roman church commissions. In four of these Caravaggio was asked to change his first efforts, or his work was rejected. These episodes included the rejection of his deeply moving masterpiece the Death of the Virgin (Paris, Louvre), which was then bought by the Duke of Mantua on the advice of Rubens . Differing circumstances lay behind these setbacks but the core problem was Caravaggio's insistent realism and his use of humble models. While this antagonized the more conservative clergy it was completely in line with much Counter-Reformation feeling as expressed, for example, by the Oratorians.

Caravaggio's quarrelsome and antisocial behaviour spiralled out of control during this period. He was sued and imprisoned for circulating obscene doggerels about a rival painter, Baglione , and according to Malvasia he threatened to knock Guido Reni's head off for ‘stealing his style’. He was also involved in a string of violent incidents with the swordsmen and whores of the Roman streets, ending with his killing of Ranuccio Tomassoni in a gang fight in May 1606 . Fleeing Rome , he was sentenced to death in absentia.